October 24, 2003 {

Back on September 7, I was run down by a minivan while riding my Magna. The damage? Dented tank, scratched both right turn signals, twisted forks, wasted front tire, bent rear brake lever, wasted right footpeg, wasted right front brake lever, scratched right handgrip, 1x3" scrape on bottom-right pipe, destroyed pipe guard on top right pipe, bent sissybar mounts, flattened screw on the back-right of the cowl, right faux-airbox cover, tach/speedo bucket and a lot of road rash. Lost most of the skin on my hands. I bought a used set of forks for $150 off ebay. one of the forks has a stuck bolt in the bottom. First, the allen head stripped. Then I tried a screw extractor. Stripped. Then I drilled a smaller hole in it and tried a smaller screw extractor. Stripped. Then I notched it with a dremel and a high-speed cutting bit. Couldn't turn it with a screwdriver, and ended up snapping a small piece of metal from it. The last resort is taking it to a machine shop. I found a shop in Tampa called Glenn's wheel polishing to polish the forks, front wheel and rotor. The price is right - $250 for the whole deal. He sends all the non-wheel stuff out to a guy named Willy at Express Polishing. If I can get the bolt out of the fork, they'll be getting dropped off tomorrow. I was referred to Mark Douglas in Alberta to get a set of new stock pipes shipped from Japan. I should hear from him in a few days about the pipes. The price is better than right - $880 for both sides, including shipping. Scott Van Cura in Michigan is a regular on the Super Magna board. I'm sending my dented tank and fender to him for repair and custom paint. I'm going with a black background with axehead tribal ghost flames in grey/silver. He's a great guy and can't wait to see the finished work. Once the insurance company sends me the check for repairs, I will be buying: A new black front fender A Metzeler ME880 front tire (Ron Ayers) New bolts all-around for the forks, including cap bolts Progressive front springs A new black gas tank (if I can find one) with a new petcock and filter Right side faux airbox cover (the one over the thermostat) Both right turn signals and stems turn signal covers (horizontal bars) from Dennis Kirk to replace my damaged ones new muffler protectors and rubber grommets All new muffler gaskets and band clamps Right footpeg assembly Highway Hawk wide-blade levers tach/speedo bucket Right handgrip A throttle lock New chrome caps for the handlebar mounts All in all, a hell of a lot of stuff. about $1200 when all's said and one, not counting the forks or pipes. I'm also going to get the original forks straightened and lightly polish them myself, to have around if my new ones go south. Last but not least - custom exhaust work. I'm going to take my damaged pipe set and slash-cut them, make some custom baffles and recess them inside the pipe where they won't be seen. I plan on making it a little louder than stock, but not too much. Drag pipes are NOT my style. Get 'em reshaped a little and rechromed. Should be fantastic when done. That's all I have for now. Just want to catalog all the planned work so I don't lose track of all that I'm doing.